Company Leadership

Board of Directors

Our dynamic, engaged board of directors believe that connecting people to healthcare providers represents a significant challenge to our generation. Closing this gap is one of the single biggest opportunities we have to reduce the cost of care using our technologies and services

Bill Taranto is President, Merck Global Health Innovation Fund LLC and Vice President, Global Health Innovation Group (GHI). Mr. Taranto is responsible for building the GHI capability for Merck. The Merck Global Health Innovation (GHI) invests in emerging companies that deliver breakthrough health care solutions and which advance Merck's mission to discover, develop and provide innovative products and services that save and improve lives. GHI has a focused strategic investment approach designed to unlock the full value of health care innovations from around the world. As a strategic growth investor, GHI's goal is to grow emerging health care solutions into meaningful businesses. Established in 2010 as an independent LLC, GHI deploys its evergreen $500 million fund to rapidly identify and develop transformative global health care opportunities. GHI is focused on identifying opportunities that are adjacent to Merck’s core business of pharmaceuticals and vaccines. Mr. Taranto is a member of the Innovative Ventures Board, a group that manages the identification and funding of portfolio businesses; and is also head of the GHI Fund LLC Management Board. Mr. Taranto is also a board member of the Imperial College of London's Intellectual Property Research Centre.

Prior to joining Merck, Mr. Taranto spent 18 years at Johnson & Johnson in various marketing, sales and business development roles with increasing responsibility. In his previous position, Executive Director, Health Care Strategy & Alliances, He was responsible for evaluating the future healthcare environment, the viability and impact of health care channels, and the creation of new health care business models. Mr. Taranto started his career as a sales representative for Janssen Pharmaceutica and progressed through various sales and marketing positions, including an assignment in Beerse, Belgium. Prior to joining J&J, Mr. Taranto spent eight years in investment banking. Mr. Taranto has a Bachelor of Business Administration from St. Bonaventure University.

Larry Lawson

Board Member

Larry Lawson, a highly successful entrepreneur, founded eCardio Diagnostics in 2004, which is operating as Preventice Services. With more than 45 years of medical device industry and health care industry experience, Larry draws on his extensive market development and commercialization expertise to identify opportunities to advance arrhythmia diagnostic solutions. As an experienced health care executive and entrepreneur, Larry was founder and CEO of Diagnostic Monitoring Associates, a national marketing and sales firm specializing in the development and delivery of cardiac services to physician practices. Prior to DMA, he held various positions within health care companies including executive management responsibilities at Johnson & Johnson, Edward Weck & Co., and Deseret Medical. He achieved success with several early-stage medical device companies including Life Med Technologies and Futuremed Interventional. As a significant shareholder, Larry serves on the board of Preventice Solutions.

Jon P. Otterstatter

Chief Executive Officer

Jon Otterstatter is the original co-founder of Preventice Technologies in 2007; formerly known as Preventice. He currently serves as the president and global strategy officer and CEO. Jon earned a reputation as a creative, solutions-oriented leader and technology expert. His skills and commitment to excellence have brought high value to global enterprises while returning above-average value for stakeholders. Prior to co-founding Preventice, Jon served as Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer for SPSS. While at SPSS, he guided the strategic direction, budget, personnel and daily operations for the company’s worldwide technology operations. He also served as Senior Vice President of Technology for ShowCase Corporation in Rochester, MN, and was a Senior Programming Manager at IBM. Jon holds a Master’s degree in Technology Management from M.I.T., and a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse.

Joe has more than two decades of experience in health care investing applying a technical engineering background coupled with an understanding of emerging technologies. He is considered to be one of the industry’s leading corporate investors. In 2016, Joe was named by Global Corporate Venturing as one of the top five rising stars.

Colleagues have called Joe instrumental in transforming Merck GHIF from a leader, not only in venture capital, but also in growth equity and M&A. He earned industry laurels when he participated in the sale of Humedica, a healthcare analytics company, to UnitedHealth Group in 2013, a transaction that produced a 17-fold return.

In addition to his success with Humedica, Joe has led investments and acquisitions in companies such as Liaison, Preventice, Physicians Interactive, Koneksa, Prognos, WellDoc, Exostar, Milheath and ClearDATA. He has evaluated thousands of digital health companies and has invested in two to three companies annually since 2011. During that same period, he has also managed 40-plus transactions at Merck, all at various stages of maturity.

Another notable success for Joe was his leadership with Preventice to further develop its remote care monitoring platform for cardiac arrhythmia patients. Joe led the Merck strategy and merger of Preventice with eCardio and eventually sold a portion of the combined company to a leading healthcare channel partner, which paid back the fund for the original investment while maintaining majority share of a more valued company. Joe also focused on the patient physician engagement space with his Physicians Interactive (now called Aptus) investments. He eventually led the acquisition of the company on behalf of MerckGHIF. Joe also led the acquisitions of MedHelp, Quantia MD and Tomorrow Networks.

Joe came to Merck from Johnson and Johnson where he spent more than 20 years in innovation and investment roles across Consumer, Pharma and Device sectors of J&J. Prior to that he was a consultant with EDS where he graduated from their Top Gun business and technology program. He went to the University of South Florida where he obtained a degree in Business/Information Systems and Engineering.

Leadership Team

The leadership team steers the strategic initiatives focusing on innovation, satisfying customer needs and improving patient adherence within the healthcare system.

Emily Benner

EVP, Research and Product Development

Emily Benner serves as the Executive Vice President of Research & Development. She joined the company in 2013. In her role, Emily leads and directs the research of future product opportunities. Emily brings over 24 years of experience to the company. She held executive roles at IBM in firmware development, development of Operating Systems, and Strategic Technical development partnerships with large multi-national corporations such as SAP and Oracle. Prior to joining the company, Emily was a Software Director at IBM where she led large development teams of 300-500 persons located in the U.S., Mexico, Germany, and India. Benner holds a Bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of North Dakota, a Master’s degree in Computer Engineering from the University of Minnesota, and an MBA from the University of Minnesota’s Carlson School of Management.

Jason Spees

Chief Commercial Officer

Jason Spees serves as Chief Commercial Officer. He joined the company in 2017. In his role, Jason is responsible for leading the sales, marketing, product management, corporate accounts, payer relations, and healthcare solutions teams. He brings 16 years of experience in sales, marketing, product management, and payer relations. Prior to joining Preventice, Jason spent 15 years at Boston Scientific in commercial roles in the areas of Diagnostics and Monitoring, Cardiac Rhythm Management, Electrophysiology, and Interventional Cardiology. His most recent roles were VP Sales Diagnostics and Monitoring and Area Vice President of Great Lakes where he led large teams of 150 persons, delivered $200M to the commercial organization, and shifted company ranking to #1 over a 5-year period. Prior to joining Boston Scientific, Jason spent 7 years as a Captain in the United States Air Force serving in the areas of Computer Programming, Program Management, and Financial Management. He received a BS in Operations Research and Engineering from the United States Air Force Academy, where he was a distinguished graduate with academic distinction (top 5% military and academic). He also received a MA in Public Management – Finance from the University of Maryland at College Park.

Ryan Ranweiler

Chief Financial Officer

Ryan Ranweiler serves as Chief Financial Officer. He brings nearly 20 years of senior financial leadership in media and technology. In his role, Ryan is responsible for leading the finance and human resources teams. Prior to Preventice, Ryan served as Chief Financial Officer for Sportradar US and SVP, CFO and Secretary of NativeX. While at NativeX, Ryan developed financial systems, reporting and controls resulting in 9 consecutive years of EBITDA profitability and leading to the successful sale of the business to Mobvista. Prior to joining NativeX, Ryan was a manager at Clifton Larson Allen where he provided attestation services and buy/sell side diligence to companies in support of their M&A activities. He began his career at Grant Thornton in Minneapolis and received a BS in Accounting from the University of Northwestern – Saint Paul. He holds an active CPA and CGMA license.

Tim Miller

EVP, Operations

Tim Miller serves as Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer. He has worked in the healthcare industry for over 25 years where he developed a strategic and entrepreneurial skill set with a depth of knowledge in clinical, regulatory, reimbursement, and operations. Tim has been leading organizations with a focused on defining economic and clinical value in both private and publicly traded companies. Prior to Preventice he was working in business develop at Mayo Clinic where he developed and validated models in remote monitoring. He holds a number of patents and received a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Minnesota.

Strong Collaborations

Collaborations with academia, business, charities and individuals are critical to build a successful, diversified, remote monitoring business. We are already involved in a wide range of collaborations with external partners but we are always keen to hear from you. Preventice Solutions is proud to be working with the following organizations to engage patients and improve outcomes.

Boston Scientific transforms lives through innovative medical solutions that improve the health of patients around the world. As a global medical technology leader for more than 35 years, we advance science for life by providing a broad range of high performance solutions that address unmet patient needs and reduce the cost of healthcare.

Mayo Clinic is a nonprofit organization committed to medical research and education, and providing expert, whole-person care to everyone who needs healing. Through 150 years growth and change, Mayo remains committed to its heritage: thorough diagnosis, accurate answers and effective treatment through the application of collective wisdom to the problems of each patient. For more information, visitwww.mayoclinic.org.

Today’s Merck is a global healthcare leader working to help the world be well. Merck is known as MSD outside the United States and Canada. Through our prescription medicines, vaccines, biologic therapies and animal health products, we work with customers and operate in more than 140 countries to deliver innovative health solutions. We also demonstrate our commitment to increasing access to healthcare through far-reaching policies, programs and partnerships. For more information, visit www.merck.com

Monebo is a leading provider of technology, which monitors, analyzes, and interprets the electrical signals of the human heart. For more information, visit http://www.monebo.com

Samsung is one of the world’s largest providers of telecommunications products and technologies. Samsung has made a commitment to collaborating with health technology companies in an effort to develop for its leading consumer devices new use cases that ultimately improve the quality of patients’ lives. Samsung provides mobile phones for Preventice's BodyGuardian Remote Monitoring System (RMS). Patient data is captured using a small wearable sensor and delivered via Bluetooth communication to a dedicated Samsung smartphone. For more information, visit: http://www.samsung.com/us/business/

Sprint (NYSE: S) is a communications services company that creates more and better ways to connect its customers to the things they care about most. Sprint served more than 57 million connections as of June 30, 2015 and is widely recognized for developing, engineering and deploying innovative technologies, including the first wireless 4G service from a national carrier in the United States; leading no-contract brands including Virgin Mobile USA, Boost Mobile, and Assurance Wireless; instant national and international push-to-talk capabilities; and a global Tier 1 Internet backbone. Sprint has been named to the Dow Jones Sustainability Index (DJSI) North America for the past four years. You can learn more and visit Sprint at www.sprint.com or www.facebook.com/sprint and www.twitter.com/sprint.

STMicroelectronics is one of the world’s largest semiconductor companies. Offering one of the industry’s broadest product portfolios, ST serves customers across the spectrum of electronics applications with innovative semiconductor solutions by leveraging its vast array of technologies, design expertise and combination of intellectual property portfolio, strategic partnerships and manufacturing strength. For more information, visit http://www.st.com

TZ Medical develops products for the Electrophysiology (EP), cardiac and critical-care communities. Over the years, TZ Medical has built a solid reputation on both listening to and understanding the needs of medical professionals. The result is optimal solutions delivering quality products that improve patient care while protecting the administrator's bottom line. For more information, visit: www.tzmedical.com.

UPS is a global leader in logistics, offering a broad range of solutions including transporting packages and freight; facilitating international trade, and deploying advanced technology to more efficiently manage the world of business. Headquartered in Atlanta, UPS serves more than 220 countries and territories worldwide. For more information, visit www.ups.com